Picture this: It’s a chilly February afternoon, you’re bundled in your coat trying to stop shivering as you enter a streetcar. You look up to ask a kind stranger where to pay and make eye contact with this monster:
To explain, I need to rewind a couple weeks. I enjoy filling my offtime by helping people with their projects, sometimes that means volunteering my hands to lift or my creative power to brainstorm, other times, I lend my whole body to be covered in liquid latex.
I saw an ad in the handy Entertainment industry Facebook page that a makeup artist needed a model for her special effects make-up class. At this point, I hadn’t experimented with SFX outside of my high school drama class or my mom’s kitchen table at Halloween.
Jade Grinde, the makeup artist, told me she wanted the backstory to be that I fell asleep in a tanning bed. Think, if Ashley & Ashlyn survived the hotbed massacre of Final Destination 3. I didn’t know what it was going to look like … but I agreed to get crispy.
On the day, Jade taped up my shoulders and basically dumped a bottle of liquid latex onto me. Check out this reveal during application:
Once Jade was done, she gave me funky mirror glasses, wrapped a towel around me, and brought me to the photo studio.
All-in-all, it was a wonderful experience. The problem started when Jade began removing what she had put on me. The makeup and latex were layered so thick, that it was coming off in never-ending clumps.
She offered to help the removal process with warmed wet wipes but mentioned a shower would be the only way to really rid me of the mess. I tried the wet wipes but ultimately decided I would just go home and shower.
Most days, I would have taken an Uber, but at this point, I was exceptionally broke & the thought of getting into a strangers car while it looks like I had a flesh-eating disease just didn’t seem like a good idea.
My winter jacket has a large hood and I could use my scarf to cover most of my face, so I made my way to the subway. This story ends where it began … a woman who was unfamiliar with the TTC walked up to ask where she could pay, and I’m pretty sure my face put the fear of God in her.
I would have taken it as an insult, but instead, I took it as a compliment for Jade! Check out her other work here!
